Assault Android Cactus
Assault Android Cactus is an arcade style twin-stick shooter by indie developer Witch Beam, released for PC on the 23rd September.
12 is Better Than 6 – Rat King Perk
Gamers can now test Ink Stains Games’ 12 is Better Than 6 new pre-alpha that introduces the player to the almighty Rat King Perk! Why cower from a hail of bullets, when your TNT laden rodent can clear the way?
Gladiators Online: Death Before Dishonor Due October
Death or Glory! Dorado Games invites gamers to step into the Coliseum for the ultimate gladiatorial battle with Gladiators Online: Death Before Dishonor, forged for a Steam release in October for Windows PC.
Blizzard Announces Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft!
Blizzard have announced their latest title, a free to play strategy card game called Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft!
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdXl3QtutQI?rel=0]
GunSwords Begins “Beta Bash” Events
One Button Studios’s turn-based PvP game GunSwords is now in Open Beta, with weekly “Beta Bash” events to take place on Thursdays and Sundays, starting on 14th February at 5pm GMT (6pm CET / 9am Pacific) and running for 24 hours.
Dead Space 3 Launches with 11 DLC Packs
Dead Space 3 is to launch with 11 DLC packs. The packs range from adding new weapons and suits to upgrades for the Scavenger Bot to improve its loot gathering speed, capacity, and even its personality.
Bulletstorm
I picked Bulletstorm up back in April, at i-42 after playing the first section on a friend’s PC, where Grayson and his group of ex-assassin-turned-pirates try to ram the General’s ship, the Ulysses.. and fail, crash landing on a planet filled with crazed gangs..
I finally got around to playing properly over the last few days, repeating the first section and then moving on to the planet where I came across the awesome Energy Leash!
I came to love this weapon when I found how easy it was to grab enemies from behind cover, dragging them to me and impaling them on nearby objects. This also earned me Skillshots such as Pricked and Voodoo Doll.. and when I’d earned enough points, I discovered the Thumper upgrade, allowing me to fling all the enemies into the air.. this was more awesome still, and came in really handy when I found myself over-run 🙂
The Flail-Gun was also amazing fun, if a little sadistic a weapon.. two explosives tied together by a short chain, which easily wrap themselves around the targetted enemy for you to detonate at your leisure.. preferably near his friends to take them out too. Normally I don’t really focus so much on guns, to the amusement and/or despair of those I’m with, but it seems the guns in this game are all rather fun. Next up was the Boneduster, an insanely powerful gun up-close.. I discovered this just prior to heading into a miniature city in the Worst Family Fun Vacation Ever section, which meant all my enemies were up close! Those who didn’t get shot by the Boneduster were kicked or whipped into surfaces which electrocuted them :>
I recently tried out the Duke Nukem Forever demo, and was disappointed by the fact you could only have two guns at a time, only changing them if you came across another on the ground. Bulletstorm allows you to carry three, including the standard weapon, or four if you include the leash, with changes available at the Drop Pods. So far, I’ve not felt that I’ve been limited.. maybe because the guns are more fun to use, maybe because there are more enemies coming at you.. though I wouldn’t object to the Shrink Ray in here too 🙂
After escaping the miniature city, I got hold of the best weapon so far.. the MechaTon, aka “Waggleton P. Tallylicker”, a remote-controlled robot dinosaur which fired lasers from its eyes!
This section lasted longer than I’d expected.. many games don’t really let you play with the biggest weapons for very long, but this level let me kill lots of enemies and destroy rather a lot of buildings 🙂
Terraria
A new game appeared in my friends’ group over the weekend – Terraria. As I have a silly number of unplayed games in my collection, I was going to give it a miss.. but they kept talking about it with such obvious enthusiasm that I started to feel a bit left out..
Terraria is a 2D scrolling adventure game which has a few similarities to Minecraft.. you start in a randomly generated world, with trees and other resources to gather. Once you have collected enough goodies, you can craft items: weapons, building materials and decorative items.
There are monsters, ranging from coloured slime with little health, right up to some fairly tough bosses, which you can summon when you’re ready to take them on. Unlike in Minecraft, the appearance of monsters is not limited to the night-time.. so while you could build a shelter and hide, it’s far better to get out there and fight!
As you find better resources and loot, you can craft stronger weapons and armour.. you can also level your character up with items which increase your total health and add a mana pool.. and you will need to do this if you’re going to take on the bosses! 🙂
Another dissimilarity to Minecraft comes in the form of the NPCs you can attract, should you build shelter for them to live in, and met a few requirements. The merchant has a range of items for sale, the nurse can heal you, the Arms Dealer sells guns, and the Guide.. well..
The Guide got me into trouble.
I started out in the world knowing very little about the game, as I wanted to experience and learn as I went along.. and seeing the Guide, I expected I’d have to follow him along a little way before getting into the game properly.
However, he led me off the grass and onto a manky grey surface with spiky weeds.. Corruption, which I’m told is not normally this close to spawn. The spiky weeds hurt, so I decided to leave the Guide to his wandering and go back to the grass.. but before I got back I met my first monster, the Eater of Souls!
I found I could take one point of health from him with my pickaxe, but before he was dead another appeared.. this was too much to handle on top of the damage from the weeds in the Corruption, and I managed to die within one minute of spawning! So much for an easy game at lunch 😉
After respawning I tried to explore to the left, but met Slimes, as well as a rather high mountain.. then night came, bringing zombies, so I went to dig down and instead met some kind of worm.. more death!
Eventually I went after the Guide, hacking away the spiky parts of Corruption so I could walk there.. I found him trapped in water above his head, still alive apparently, and as soon as I’d made a path he headed back up the hill. I cut a path down into one of the caves, and trapped him there!
I was surprised how quickly the corruption spread across the dirt tiles.. I came to take screenshots at the end of play, and found it had grown like this.. 😮
Terraria also has a multiplayer mode, and after a friend set up a server I joined them. Multiplayer allows co-op and PvP, which you can toggle on individually.. you can also form teams which adds a little indicator to show which direction and how far away your friends are.
Both friends had played for a while already, and as characters keep all their equipment and resources when they enter a world, they already had some decent gear. As I was now on my home PC, and the game has no Steam cloud support, I had to start from scratch, but I didn’t mind as I’d barely collected or looted anything yet.
I was given a better pickaxe, as well as some bombs and some other random items.. I went exploring for resources while one friend built a large tower and filled it with rooms.. this meant the NPCs started to arrive, though till I’ve earnt more money I can’t buy from them. 😉
He also went and summoned the Eye of Cthulu.. I got killed trying to take a look at him the first time, but after being given hearts and levelling up somewhat, I was able to take part in the second fight! 🙂
We fought him from a platform, so there was plenty of room to avoid him as he swung past. As well as attacking you by himself, he fires little eyes at you.. the magic boomerang came in handy for those, killing them before they got too close 🙂
The Eye’s second phase was a little creepier, as the pupil and iris were replaced by a mouth full of sharp teeth..
It wasn’t too much longer before we killed him though.. the flaming arrows, magic boomerang and Undoer’s spiky ball of win made sure of that! 🙂
More Amnesia
I didn’t complete Amnesia at the recent i-event, despite the previous plan to play it with a friend and scare ourselves silly with it late at night.
It turned out that there were usually too many people around that I wanted to talk to, and when I did start the game, attempts by a couple of friends to make me jump while playing actually made me less scared by the game as I wasn’t so focused on it.
I loaded up my last save to find I had obviously run on without looking where I was going.. I was in a dark room with absolutely no clue where I was. Not only did I have no idea where I was, my lantern was out of oil.. I tried to find a torch or candle to light, when I heard something behind me..
I turned and was confronted with this.
I’m only slightly ashamed to admit I screamed out loud..
Having no weapons (I believe there are none, anywhere in the game) I attempted to run away, a whimpering wreck trying to find somewhere to get away to, but still being hopelessly lost. This hideous thing caught up with me and smacked me to death, and I realised I should probably load up an earlier save so that I at least knew where I was to start with.
This was much nicer looking.. but I know what’s coming! :'(
Completing Dead Rising 2
Last time I played this game, we found ourselves slightly frustrated by the Psycho encounters which we always seemed to run into when we had Survivors in tow. Eventually we left it with ‘Case 4-1 : The Source’ unfinished, as Amber and Crystal cut us down again and again with their katanas, forcing us to repeat a large chunk of the game.
This time, we got ourselves a better save-point and returned to give TK’s sleazy girls the beating they deserved, though not before trying out a few more crazy weapons and levelling our characters up a bit more..
There was also a repeat of “Dressing Up with The Undoer” as he found even worse clothes to wear..
Seriously.. look at that hat.. 😉
After killing the twins, we found the regular zombies were rather easy for a while, so we racked up the points playing with more custom weapons.. my favourites this time being the Defiler, made by combining the Fire Axe and Sledgehammer, and the Lightsa.. er, Laser Sword, made with a torch and gems.
In the end we screwed up slightly by not giving TK his Zombrex.. so while Katey was loaded onto the helicopter and the day was saved, Chuck Greene was not. I think this calls for a replay, and if we can start again with levelled characters, we might be able to save a few more survivors this time. 🙂